Just for Fun

Your Scholastic Strength Is Deep Thinking

You aren't afraid to delve head first into a difficult subject, with mastery as your goal. You are talented at adapting, motivating others, managing resources, and analyzing risk. You should major in: Philosophy Music Theology Art History Foreign language

What Should You Major In?

You Are a Prophet Soul

You are a gentle soul, with good intentions toward everyone. Selfless and kind, you have great faith in people. Sometimes this faith can lead to disappoinment in the long run. No matter what, you deal with everything in a calm and balanced way. You are a good interpreter, very sensitive, intuitive, caring, and gentle. Concerned about the world, you are good at predicting people's feelings. A seeker of wisdom, you are a life long learner looking for purpose and meaning. You are a great thinker and communicator, but not necessarily a doer. Souls you are most compatible with: Bright Star Soul and Dreaming Soul

What Kind of Soul Are You?

Who Should Paint You: Salvador Dali

You're a complex, intense creature who displays many layers. There's no way a traditional portrait could ever capture you!

What Artist Should Paint Your Portrait?

Thirsty

At work on Sunday, as I once again sought to remember worship songs to hum along to while I worked away on brainless and mundane tasks on my own, God brought to mind a song that had a great deal of significance in my life a couple of years ago.

Looking back, it is a song that very closely and carefully describes a whole variety of times in my faith journey. Initially, it was significant because it spoke of my longings for God, the struggle I had in deciding if I would accept and make my own the God of my parents, and eventually, as the song ends, reached the point of deciding to pursue God and faith. That was about six years ago, near the beginning of my last year of high school.

As I came back to the song again on Sunday morning, I was surprised by how closely the same lyrics apply to the journey of the last two or three years, and even of the last six months. As I've struggled to understand and accept the role of the Holy Spirit I've wrestled, felt so very alone, and finally plunged in with abandon to the life God is leading me towards.

The song, you ask? It's titled simply "Thirsty" and is written by Chris Rice.

I'm so thirsty, I can feel it

Burnin' through the furthest corners of my soul. Deep desire, can describe this

nameless urge that drives me somewhere

though I don't know where to go

Seems I've heard about a river from someone who's been

And they tell me once you reach it, oh you'll never thirst again

So I have to find the river, somehow my life depends on the river

Holy River, I'm so thirsty.

Other waters I've been drinkin'

But they always leave me empty like before

Satisfaction - all I'm askin'

Could I really be this thirsty if there weren't something more?

I'm so thirsty, I can feel it

Burnin' through the furthest corners of my soul. Deep desire, can't describe this

nameless urge that drives me somewhere

though I don't know where to go

I'm on the shore now of the wildest river

And I kneel and beg for mercy from the skies

But no one answers - gotta take my chances

'Cause somethin' deep inside me's cryin'

"This is why you are alive."

So I plunge into the river with all that I am

Prayin' this will be the river where I'll never thirst again

I'm abandoned to the river and now my life depends on the river

Holy River.

I'm so thirsty.

Dangerous Da Vinci?

The whole world seems to be talking about the Da Vinci Code at the moment. I don't know if this is a particularly good or bad thing. It frustrates me that Christians get so up in arms about something that is really rather harmless - a fictional tale - and the key word is fictional. And honestly, I'm going to keep this short, because I don't care all that much, and I don't particularly want to add to the mess of stuff already out there about this topic.

I actually didn't have any idea what the book was about, so I borrowed the copy my brother bought to read on the planes on his recent trip to Ukraine, and I read it over the last couple of days. I'd heard it was an amusing read in a "you have to check your brain out" kind of way. I enjoyed the read. Brown is a good writer. He crafts supsense well, if somewhat predictably at times.

But here's what got me. His writing seems so true - all the legends and mythology surrounding the Christian faith - with just enough truth thrown in for it to be confusing. I have a four year degree in church history. I've never heard any of the stuff Brown writes about the grail before. And I assure you that I had professors who love controversy - if the kind of thing Brown was writing about was recognized by anything more than fringe scholars, I'd have heard about it.

As to the whole bit about reclaiming the sacred feminine, I honestly thought that Brown made some good points. He took it to a bit of an extreme that was perhaps unneccesary, but extreme seems to be stock in trade these days. As to the whole sacred feminine thing, I refer you to past posts I've written about feminist theology for some of my thoughts on the matter. I also recommend that you truly study Moravian theology during what is occasionally referred to as their "radical" period - Zinzendorf and his followers had a strong understanding of the sacred feminine that earned them much criticism, but seems to be a somewhat scriptural and inspired thought, if again a bit extreme at times.

All in all, I think the Da Vinci Code is far less of a big deal than we are making it out to be. I don't think it is particularly dangerous - yes, it goes too far, and yes, Brown's claims of historical accuracy are ridiculous, but dangerous? I don't think so...